JPF Home Page Forums Musician Gear and Techniques Music Theory and Education Berklee College of Music: Opinions?

Hi there,

Im curious to know about any JPFers experiences with this college. I have my BFA in theater arts and am thinking about taking the songwriting/music business masters program. So has anyone here had any experience with this college and how was it for you? Has anyone taken the online courses?

ive also been thinking about the opportunity cost. so if schools costs $8k what else could i use that money for. would i be able to get the same education by looking for private teachers...

any opinions?

thanks in advance,
chris

Hey Chris,

What do you want to get out of your education? Do you need the sheepskin or just knowledge and skill?

I believe education is valuable in and of itself...as long as it is of a good quality. However, that doesn't mean I'm going to enroll in the Vanderbilt law program just because I have a tangential interest in law. Are you going to teach? Are you learning to be a performing musician? In classical? Serious jazz?

Another important question: Do you have $8k to spend? Do you have a lot of debt? Are you going to borrow this money? (I know a lot of people don't believe this, but using a credit card is not borrowing from your future, it is borrowing from a bank which then owns your future.)

Notice, so far, I haven't addressed Berklee itself. Some people get "name-itus." When I first decided to play the bass, I used to think I really needed a 1972 Fender Precision bass, they are expensive. I dreamed about it. I had pictures of one. I used to go over to a friend's house and play his. In the meantime, I missed out on bass playing gigs. One day I just went out and bought a Peavey bass. I started working the next week. Now, nothing wrong with the Fender bass...it's one of the classic basses of all time...but I've played bass with more million-selling artists than you can shake a stick at, and I still don't have one. Berklee is a world renowned institution. I'm sure their education is next to none.

As to my experience, I majored in music at Chicago State University and have never taken any classes from Berklee, though I have friends who did and they were very pleased with the institute.

Hope this helps.

Mike

thanks for the reply mike,

for me, im looking only for the knowledge and skill. If i can find private teachers in my location i would highly consider taking private classes. It would be possible to spend on straight up learning. I just cant tell if it would be wiser to hire private teachers and manipulate exactly what i want to be learning or if it is wiser to take on a university approach.

i have a BFA in Acting, professional certificate in physical theater. so i know quite a few things about the audience/performer roles and how to work it.

i suppose anything i want to learn i should be able to hire teachers. hmm right on, hehe just a little brainstorming.

thanks again,
chris

I'm 9 weeks through my First Berklee ( edit - online ) Course. I'm doing the melody course.

I've found it invaluable. It's organised , it's got me organised . The tutor , Andrea Stolpe is a professional writer who's list of artists includes Faith Hill , so you getting people who have done it to tutor you.

I'm writing stuff that I wouldn't have written two months ago and I know have a much better understanding of Melodic structure ( though I'm keen to learn more ) .

I have my own business and for me the money isn't an issue. I'm time poor . So having the structure , all the info handed to me on a plate for me is well worth the money.

I've done two seminars with Pat Pattison who has created their lyric course and these are ( IMHO ) essential. He ( again IMHO ) approaches lyrics from a different angle to people like Shiela Davis and I can't recall seeing alot of the info he presents else where . He is also a very effective speaker , and a nice guy .

I'm planning on doing further courses.

Obviously there is a lot of good info out on the net , and at cheaper prices , but there is value in the courses.

Cliff

Chris,

Berklee is Berklee. It probably doesn't get much better. But if you're looking for something you can do online and many self-paced courses, have a look at songu.com.

I don't know how much depth of knowledge you are looking for but SongU has quite a lot. It's a lot less expensive than college and also provides pitching opportunities if your songs are up to snuff.

I've been a member for almost two years and can say it's the best bang for my buck but it still depends on what you need.

Van Borden

well, i live about an hour away from berklee so was actually thinking of hoofing it to the space. Thanks for pointing me to songu, ill have to check that site out. Somebody on this site said something to the effect, everything is an opportunity to learn. Now i realize what it is i dont know and go after that. Its helped a ton. Ive been running through theory again, its relation to the fretboard. crafting new lines and allowing myself to be whisked into something new musically, something i hear and practice to play. I am going to take some more voice lessons. looking for a teacher in MA. i have been taking trial lessons with some different folks here but its not clicking. The voice teacher will be part of my team.. i want to find someone that is as excited to teach me as i am to learn. its a hard stack to swallow when so many teachers are indifferent to their students. as i run around looking for teachers i feel like im auditioning them. It is my money after all. i should be able to tell if ill stay with them in the first minute of a lesson. finding the right instructor, harder than it sounds!

thanks for the responses folks,
chris

It's really hard to find the right voice teacher to match what you want to learn or how you want to learn. For that matter, this applies to pretty much any kind of musical instructions. Many instructors seem hell bent on teaching a certain methodology in a certain way even if it's not what you want to learn. Sometimes, you do have to learn what you'd rather skip in order to get to what you really want to do but overall, you should be able to steer your musical education in the direction you want to take it. Other times, you find someone willing to be flexible but unable to teach in a way that helps you learn.

I had a great guitar instructor years ago who just seemed a natural fit for me. He was teaching me jazz standards and using those to help me learn the fretboard and soooo many cool chords. We were just getting into reading and finding the melody notes when he became terminally ill. Of course, I was sad for him but also disappointed because I have not yet found another instructor like him. I'm sure they are out there and if I looked hard enough, I would find one. I just don't have the same amount of free time to devote to it.

Basically, you just have to keep searching until you find the right fit for you. Sometimes you get lucky and find someone fast. Other times you just have to keep searching.

Best of Luck to you.
Van

Van, do you work for Song U.? Perhaps in the sales department?

Hey Pogram,

I don't know about Van, but I do know that I'm not in the sales department at Song U., nor am I a member (have only met Danny and Sara a few times) but having looked at their site and read what others have to say about them, I'd endorse them in a heartbeat.

To Van,

Yes, voice teachers use whatever methodology they've learned, that is the good ones do. Even better voice teachers may have learned several methods, but the voice teacher that lets the student direct the lessons may be a poor one, even a harmful one. Learning proper vocal technique is a bit different than learning proper guitar technique. It is easier to quickly do irreparable damage to the vocal chords than to the fingers. If your fingers or wrists, elbows, neck or shoulders start hurting, you usually have time to correct your technique before serious problems crop up. It is possible to do permanent damage in one performance singing. If you don't believe me, let me know and I'll tell you a story of a friend of mine whose voice was ruined one evening.

All the Best,
Mike

Chris, there's an added benefit of attending a college with a strong curriculum AND instructors. The benefit being the opportunity to network and the doors that the faculty can possibly open for you. I'm sure you're aware that that alone can make all the difference in one's career.

I graduated from the University of Miami, which had/has a very strong performance department and the faculty was instrumental in launching many of my classmates on to nice recording/performance careers in the business.

Great! I'll be sure to post a link to my sight once I become a special member. I can hardly wait!

Berkleemusic online has been fantastic for me. I'm in the middle of my second course. Your milage may vary.

Hey John,

Which courses have you taken? What are some of the details of your experience?

The Berkleemusic Online site is impressive, they offer a lot of interesting courses which look useful to the average musician. They're a little expensive (eight hundred to a thousand per course) but they certainly have the "name."

Mike

Mike:

Thanks for asking. Sorry in advance for a long, hopefully usefully detailed, post...

I have taken and successfully completed the "Lyric Writing: Tools and Strategies" course this spring/summer, and am about halfway through the "Commercial Songwriting Techniques" course. There are quite a few other courses in the songwriting realm, but LWTS is the foundation upon which the other lyric courses are based upon (although there's not a lot of requirements for what order you take the lyric-oriented things in. I can't speak to prerequisites on the musical side of things, at least not yet).

I bought the text books for the first course in 2005 (I had no intention then of taking the class, it was just coincidence), so I was familiar with (and had applied in a limited way) some of the concepts and techniques going into the class, which helped somewhat.


All of these classes are 12 weeks long, in sync with the college semester schedule, with assignments almost every day. So just taking one is a serious workload - keeping in mind the more you put into the class, the more you get out of it. In fact I have just about decided to take a semester's hiatus so I can get out and do more open mics or what not in town, with songs recently written, using what I've learned. Then, back to the well for some more punishment - er, learning opportunities.

A section of a class is about 8 to 12 students; there might be none, one or more sections of a class taught on any given semester, depending on who signs up for what.

All the interaction of the class is via the web. So you post assignments when you get them done, at your convenience. On these two courses, there are weekly functions where everyone meets via online "chat" at the same time, but the vast majority of activity can be done at your own pace (although every assignment does have a deadline, so you pretty much need to stay current).

My first class had us all "Object Writing" on an instructor-selected topic for a set amount of time (e.g. 10 minutes, five minutes, or on some, 1-1/2 minutes), Monday thru Friday. This was to be used as the raw material for assignments. So from just my own object writing I now have a whole notebook full of interesting ideas to work on. (or I can always do some new stuff, too).

In addition to the OW, we usually had what I would call "small" assignments - applying a particular technique on say, two to six lines, then posting them. e.g. applying different rhyme schemes, manipulating section structure and line length, etc.

Also required was critiquing other student's object writing and/or assignments.



For my purposes, auditing the course (saves some $) was just fine - which means basically they told me if I passed or failed, but there's no college credit granted. Nonetheless it's still expensive.

If I may step aside from the details of the experience, and evangelize about one of many things I got out of the first course: How much would it be worth as a lyricist to never have writer's block again, or be stuck for a second verse? No course will help anyone with the discipline needed to actually do the work (maybe army boot camp would?), but I am quite confident now in being able to "unstuck" anything at all, even other people's material. (I have always been able to come up with music ideas anytime I want, in a number of styles, etc. But not lyrics.)

This is not to say that what I'd come up with would be "the best" right out of the gate - I would say the old hands here at JPF know just how hard it is to make that "this is the best, it's done" decision. But that blank page is the worst possible thing you can have in place of lyrics you know you need.

And, I figure if I'm gonna have to write several hundred crappy songs to get that first good one (and right now my current head start of many crappy songs doesn't really count), the one that really connects with people, they need to at least be several hundred "complete" - finished - crappy songs.



I am absolutely certain that someone else's experience in the class is going to be different. It depends on your attitude, what you are already good at, how comfortable you are at revealing your talents and weaknesses, how well you interact with other creative people (who definitely will be on other wavelengths and have different goals).

Based on conversations with students and student advisors at Berklee, the online school appears to be 100% subject to the same quality standards that the brick and mortar school has. So, I would say the "name" factor does apply in that regard too. But in the end, the question is: did I learn anything useful? In my case, I would say, absolutely, many things that are all immediately useful.


I intend to explore other educational opportunities here in town, too, because I think there's always more to learn about songwriting.

If you or anyone else has any questions, please fire away.


(edited for minor grammatical mistakes)

John,

Thanks for the post. Good info. I believe we can't learn too much.

Mike

Hi Mike,

No, I'm not in the sales department for SongU but I'm a very satisfied customer. Danny and Sara are first class people and the effort they put into that site is proof of their passion.

I didn't mean that a music instructor should allow the student to direct the instruction to the degree that bad habits are not corrected and such. What I mean is that a student like me has a very specific agenda for any type of musical instruction, whether it be to learn how to flat pick or learn Travis picking or whatever the case. In that vein, it's my responsibility to find a teacher who can teach me that specific method in a way that works well for me. It's just not always easy to find... I certainly understand that in order to run, you first have to crawl, walk, etc...

Thanks for the input.

Van

Dear Van G. Borden: Mike didn't ask if you worked in the sales department at Song U., I did! lol. Get with the program, dude! lol

Lousy football team. But band at halftime is great.

Just to weigh in... I've belonged to SongU for just over 6 months and the courses I have taken are good. They do offer instructor feedback and also pitch opps as well. On the downside, you structure your own learning or you attend instructor-led classes at specific times on-line... but invaribly the instructor-led classes fall during the evenings, when I am teaching, and so I've only yet been able to do the at-your-own-time classes.

I've been to a couple of in-person classes with Pat Pattison (and I have his books), and his approach is different from Sheila Davis, Jason Blume, John Braheny & others... and is interesting as well.

I agree with Mike that good technical instruction is important, but I also think that the approach should be tailored to the student - in other words, the student learns the necessary things for good health, but at their own speed of understanding and competency... and they should have some choice of repertoire as long as it fits their voice.

Lastly, personally I find working one on one with a teacher best. I learn languages, repertoire, guitar, etc better if I am with a teacher who is focussed on helping me grow my weak areas and maintain my strong. Not that classes are bad, but I get bored if we have to keep going over the basics all the time.

H

PogromWright, I've been ignoring you because I thought you were a troll. However, since I received a phone call from an old friend tonight, I think I know who you are. Are you initials RFC? This has to be you because there is no way you'd know my middle initial otherwise. Plus the fact that you kept trying to get me to respond to you was something my ole buddy RFC would do just to see if I could figure out who it was. It all makes sense now but I'm afraid I wouldn't have made a very good detective.

LOL, I thought you were some nut case stalking me... Good one... My fellow JPFers were wondering why you were dredging up old posts and I happened to notice that you were responding to an inordinate number of my posts.

That said, I'll answer your question directly. I do not work for SongU. I'd still recommend them to anyone who doesn't have the greenbacks to attend Berkley or some of other fine school of music.

Van,

Hopefully this is the person you suspect. Otherwise, you are correct: the way to deal with flamers and trolls is to ignore them.

Mike, I'm 99% sure of it after reviewing all the posts of mine he was responding to. He has been dropping all kinds of hints in different threads but I didn't put it all together until he called me last night. After that, plus knowing my middle initial, I'd be really surprised if I was wrong on this one. Otherwise, I wouldn't give a troll the time of day.

Thanks,

Van

Chris -
if money is no object, if you aren't going to rely on this as your way of living, then taking songwriting at berklee could be a great experience. A few friends of mine went there, one is making a name for himself as a jazz trumpeter but can't say that the others are doing anything a non-music schooled musician is doing already.

If you believe that this education will make you a successful writer that you can make a living with it... it's probably a dream. I'd recommend something else for a career.

lol...... i try not to let my personal experiences jade others. My one mistake was not getting my graduate degree when I had the time/ability to do so.

good luck....Berklee is probably what you make of it.
Dave